Online Marketing Blog from metrocafe311

The long awaited arrival of the Quality Score “improvements” on Google Adwords was announced on the Official AdWords Blog yesterday morning, expected to go live “over the next few days.” Last month, news of the changes to the quality score were announced, and the industry responded by asking question after question about how to prepare for the change. The news sparked Interactive Return’s attention, as the quality score can heavily affect the appearance of our ads to the right target.

The quality score improvements will add a new dimension to the way Interactive Return manages its campaigns, as the main goal is to maximise conversions for a lower cost for most of our clients. Outlining the quality score changes will allow us to see that the quality score changes will require close monitoring of each campaign individually, as each will be affected differently.

The main change involves the Quality Score being calculated in real-time. Google says this will make the score more accurate, because the calculation will take place at the exact time of each search query, based on factors such as geographical location and the actual search query. Take a basic example: if your ad has a high minimum bid for being “irrelevant” when someone searches for “swimming pools” in Ireland, it will now automatically determine that people in the United States are searching for this and clicking on your ads more often, allowing you to optimise for this location specifically, all because of the real-time functionality of the quality score!

The second main change to the Quality Score is that keywords will no longer hold an “inactive for search” status, no matter what. Google says that “all keywords are active because they are evaluated for every relevant query.” The AdWords Blog answered questions people had about this change, stating that by keeping all keywords active, there is a higher chance that the keywords evaluated will be relevant; whereas before, if your keyword was “inactive for search” your ad would not appear regardless of how relevant it was.

The third change outlined was that the “minimum bid” will be no more, and it is to be replaced by the “first page bid.” According to Google, these bids “provide a more actionable and useful metric to advertisers.” The first page bid allows you to more accurately aim to get on the first page of search results, which is of course the ideal place to be visible; but also where the most competition is happening. The bid is based on the exact match version of the search query, your ad’s quality score, and advertiser competition for that query.

It will be important to pay close attention to the first page bid, as you will find in many cases that your minimum bid is just not enough. The Google AdWords Blog predicted that your bid estimates will increase significantly for words in which there is a lot of advertiser competition; whereas it may stay the same as your current minimum bid for words that are less competitive.

The changes may cause frustration for search advertisers, because you may see that high-volume keywords are receiving less traffic for more money. On the other hand, it is possible that you’ll see less impressions and clicks, but more valuable traffic that will increase your conversions and bring down your cost per conversion. The effects of the new quality score will depend on each account you manage, but with the quality score coming out over the next few days, this will also require careful attention paid to what the change has meant for your Overall results.

Emer Lawn, Online Marketing Executive, Interactive Return